BOSTON AFROBEAT SOCIETY

Genre: Funk, Jazz, World Music

Website: //www.myspace.com/bostonafrobeat

Contact:
adam@bostonafrobeat.com
MP3 (click name to download; click player to stream):

	Revival Time

MORE ABOUT BOSTON AFROBEAT SOCIETY

The Boston Afrobeat Society is the Hub's answer to the 'Global Afrobeat Movement.' Less than two years since its official start in July 2005, the BAS is one of Boston's hottest, most talked about bands and won the 2006 Boston Music Award for Best World Music Act.

After a recent 'live' performance on WERS (Emerson College) -- the nation's top-rated college radio station -- The Weekly Dig exclaimed, "The Boston Afrobeat Society on WERS' Live Music Week 2006 represents one of Boston's super-solid local bands kicking ass and taking names!"

In addition, the BAS is a resident band at Matt Murphy's Pub (www.mattmurphyspub.com) in Brookline, MA, home to Pub Records (www.pubrecords.com) and at Zebulon in Brooklyn, NY. The BAS is currently finishing work on their first full-length record entitled 'Revival Time' due out in Spring 2007.

AFROBEAT, created by Nigerian musician Fela Anikulapo Kuti (1938-1997), blends African Highlife with Jazz, Funk, and traditional Trance music. Also a revolutionary/visionary, Fela used his lyrics to call for social reform. The BAS feeds on this inspiration to create original instrumental Afrobeat with fiery rhythmic expressions, hard-hitting grooves, and powerful horn solos. The Society strives to create a communion where people of all backgrounds can unite in collective energy and dance and to spread awareness of the political and spiritual messages which fuel the music.

The BAS recently organized a partnership with the Green Grease Monkeys (www.greengreasemonkey.com), a Boston-based company that specializes in converting vehicles with diesel engines to run on vegetable oil. To promote fuel-efficiency, the BAS used a school bus powered by Waste Veggie-Oil (WVO) for its East Coast Tour 2006, eliminating the need for gasoline on the trip.

The BAS originally started as a project of musician Adam Clark while he was a student at Boston's New England Conservatory of Music. In early 2003, after seeing the Antibalas Afrobeat Orchestra perform, Adam felt a sudden lack of "seriously danceable and socially conscious" music in the region. Soon after, he decided to throw together a large group of musicians to play Fela's "Lets Start" at NEC's annual 'Battle of the Bands'. His only intention was to get everyone out of his or her "head-bobbing seats" and up dancing. The people danced -- and the band won. Little did Adam know that this event would spark an intense fire within himself and the community around him to spread the sounds and messages of Afrobeat and Fela Anikulapo Kuti.

The seeds planted in Spring 2003 came to fruition in July 2005 when Adam's pickup band officially became the Boston Afrobeat Society. The band played every Thursday from July through September at Hoffa's Swiss Alps Restaurant Bar & Lounge in Cambridge, MA. Since then, the BAS has exploded onto Boston's music scene and performed at nationally known venues such as The Paradise Lounge, The Middle East, Matt Murphy's Pub, The Lizard Lounge, and The Western Front. To preview the upcoming album, the BAS Spring 2006 Demo is now available for download at www.myspace.com/bostonafrobeat. You can also watch video of the band on YouTube by searching Boston Afrobeat Society.

The Boston Afrobeat Society is: Matt Donnelly (percussion), Cole Kamen-Green (trumpet), Adam Clark (drums), Sean Frenette (guitar), Eric Lane (keyboards), Samba Cisse (sabar drums), Drew Sayers (tenor sax), Nick Videen (alto sax), Julee Avallone (baritone sax), Bennett Miller (bass), Alex Asher (trombone), and David Bailis (guitar). Members of the BAS can also be seen around the Northeast performing with The Foundation Movement, Kings Highway, BQEZ, Dead Cat Bounce, Depth Quartet, and Samba Lolo and are current and former students of numerous internationally renowned musicians including Danilo Perez, Rakalam Bob Moses, Robin Eubanks, Bob Brookmeyer, Dave Holland, Jerry Leake, Michael Cain, George Garzone, Cecil McBee, and Ran Blake.